


22nd.

by judeswriting



Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: Angst, M/M, Nostalgia, Severely Angst, post-breakup fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 08:25:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10407972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/judeswriting/pseuds/judeswriting
Summary: It was March 22nd, 2017, when Gerard picked up the phone.  [unashamedly, Frerard]





	

_**22nd.** _

The thing about March 22nd was that it forever lived in all the possible pasts.    
Gerard had always tried to move forward, ever since the band split, and on a more personal level, ever since he’d started to get better. Moving forward was a process, a concept, that had taken nearly a decade to even begin to be understood, but once it had become clear to him, it had also turned into his only ever-changing multifaceted goal.  Moving forward had meant and still meant a thousand of different possibilities, realities, ideas. Staying clean and sober, staying stable, creating his own processes of self-love, turning therapy into meditation and vice versa, turning art into therapy and vice versa, turning family into a core capable of keeping him anchored, turning art from music to comics to music back again to comics on a wider scale, to else. He’d even pondered about writing a book at some point.    
March 22nd, though, lived in its own bubble. Far from any idea regarding the future, far from any process of artistic self-improvement, it was made up of how the past had been shaped and how it could have been shaped instead. On March 22nd, Gerard missed the guys more than ever.  Not that they hadn’t been hearing from each other. They still had a group chat, he’d catched up with Ray on a gig a couple months earlier — December 2016, perhaps? —, he’d even catched up with the whole band to spend a day with a fan. Well, except Frank, for _logistical_ and _geographic_ reasons, which perhaps was for the better.  Not that they hadn’t talked about coming back, be it even only for a commemorative tour. Still, they were all aware their personal roads had yet to be walked, and they were in no emotional place to burst into that enormous project that was My Chemical Romance. Not again, not yet, not now.  
Normally, he’d cope with all that. His own path was exhaustingly satisfying, and he knew he could say the same of the guys. Nostalgia mixed with a certain amount of hope that perhaps in any other moment, things could get — different. It all mixed with a fair bit of rationality.  
 The thing about March 22nd, though, was that it lived on a plane where he’d never clicked the posting button on that long, long letter in the coldest of spring afternoons.  It had been four years, now, but the feeling of awful wrongness was still not easy to take in. Now the thing about Gerard was, he’d always been — let’s say, extreme. Artistically, for instance. In the way he poured his thoughts and feelings down into lyrics, in the way he played with his own expression on stage, in the way he went from a concept album as dark as humanly possible to a bright-coloured rebel story in the span of a few years.  His brain worked in polar opposites, and after nearly forty years of life, he knew that well. He knew he could get over-emotional, over-sensitive and over-impulsive. He knew, more than anything, that March 22nd was a harder day than most. He should have known that, when he picked up his phone. He could’ve, he would’ve known, and he never cared, not once.  
Because March 22nd was made up of lives he had never lived, lives he had cut off with a goodbye, and once every year, they demanded being lived.    
The telephone rang once. Gerard started regretting his decision as soon as he was faced with the unbearable anxiety of waiting for the call to be answered, or put down. _He could be with the band_ , he thought, as the telephone rang twice. Which one, now? He smiled a bit. The guy had changed more bands than pants, honestly. It rang a third time. _He could be with Jamia_.  
It rang a fourth time, and he wondered whether stopping now would’ve been a better decision.   
But it was March 22nd. It was every tour they had ever played. It was every night they had ever spent fighting. It was every interview they had ever talked in. It was every time they had put their makeup on and walked on stage. It was that time he’d written that G note, never knowing it would become iconic. It was that time Frank had taken him home after he puked his own soul away. It was that time he’d composed _Famous Last Words_ to the awe of his brother. It was the house they’d locked themselves in for _The Black Parade_. It was the days they toured with the FOB guys and crew. It was every day they hadn’t played a single note, it was the roar in the crowd when they sang _Helena_ one last time. It was even every kiss.    
The phone stopped ringing. « Hello? »   
He sounded — asleep. Gerard was shaken by the sudden thought that he wasn’t in America, and he hadn’t even thought about that.  
« You were sleeping », he said, guilt escaping his voice. It had been so many years, God, so many, their bond changing an awful number of times. But he still didn’t want to hurt him, not in any way. Not even futile ways.    
« I was. What the — fuck, Gee. Couldn’t you just text the group chat? »   
Gerard smiled. Frank wasn’t Frank without swearing every two words. Knowing he was still the same gave him a sort of patient and quiet feeling, a feeling that everything was somehow still alright, even if it wasn’t. Even if texting on a group wouldn’t have been the same at all, and they were both aware of it.  « Where are you? », he asked. Then, rushedly, without a pause, « Do you want me to close this call? » He heard him laughing in the background.   
« No, don’t mind. I’m awake now. I’m in Russia and it’s fucking four am. What is it in New Jersey, afternoon? »  
 This made it all different, Gerard thought. March 22nd had yet to start, for Frank. He was forcing it to start, right here and now. Part of him felt weird about this, part of him thought it was only legit.  « It’s two in the afternoon. What are you doing in Russia, kicking Putin’s ass? »   
Frank sighed. « If only. I have a gig in — some city starting with a ch sound and ending with, I don’t know, the same as kalashnikov. »    
Gerard felt the need to stay careful. Careful and polite, trying not to break whatever was left of them. Whatever that was. It had been four years and it was still weird — having their own lives, not touring together. Even when they’d both married, moved on — they were still close, in a way that was not romantic and not friendly either. It was exhausting, but it was something; then it turned into a large void.    
He stayed silent. It wasn’t common of him, not back in the day, but he’d learned to appreciate silence in the latest years. He waited for Frank to talk.  « Why did you call? »  
 What a weird question, _why did you call_. One would expect such a phrase to be spoken harshly, icily, but his voice wasn’t hostile, it was pained, and that was worse.  He thought of a thousand lies, a hundred easy answers, a dozen ways to manipulate the truth.    
« It’s March 22nd », he uttered then. There was no running from it.    
This time it was Frank who stayed silent. Gerard had this memory of him being enormously patient when he got drunk and fucked things up. If he had to describe him with a bunch of words, caring and patient would definitely be up on the list, despite his tattoed little devil appeareance. He missed analyzing the curves of the tattoos on his hand every day, but it wasn’t something he could just say, was it?   
« I know. Of course I know. I was thinking of playing one of our songs tonight, in fact. »   
« Do you ever? », Gerard asked.  « At times. Do you? »  He knew the answer, because Gerard had talked about it in more than one interview. Not that it mattered.  
« No, I don’t; not yet. » He sighed. « Which song? », he added then.    
« Uh », Frank answered, as casually as possible, « _Demolition Lovers_ , perhaps. »   
That was it. Perhaps that was the core of it all. It was March 22nd and beneath it all, there was a possible life where they’d stayed together; not just the band, _them_. A possible life they had destroyed, reducing it to the idea of an idea. _Demolition Lovers_ had been their hymn, back before they even knew they were building each other an anthem. And it wasn’t the only one — from then, up to _The World Is Ugly_ , ten years later, when things were already said and done, and never forgotten. It was beyond him to stop himself from singing softly; there was no point in stopping either.  « _And after all the things we put each other through and_ », he whispered, « _I would drive on to the end with you / A liquor store or two keeps the gas tank full / And I feel like there's nothing left to do / But prove myself to you and we'll keep it running—_ »  
He ended the verse with a quiet laughter, deprived of all happiness. They had thrown a dozen lifetimes away because they were too fucked up to keep existing; it was a fact, and it never got easier. He wondered whether Frank had by any chance watched _La La Land_ , recently.  
 « It was a damn beautiful song. You were good ».  
 Gerard snorted. « I am good. Don’t pretend you don’t read my comics. »  He could feel him smile on the other side of the phone.  
« Yeah. I do. Look, perhaps—. »  He stopped himself. As always, as ever. _Perhaps we could see each other_ , Gee thought, _perhaps you could come say hi to the kids, Bandit and Mikey’s child too, perhaps we could hang, perhaps this could turn into something not rotten, perhaps we’re not meant to be almost lovers forever, with a ruined future friendship on our achievement list_.  « Perhaps I should go to sleep », Frank said then.    
« Perhaps you should », he agreed.  He couldn’t say which of the two parts was more wounded. He suddenly felt the need to write out a fucked up comic with Time as its main antagonist. He wondered whether they could have made it, this time around — when it was already too late.  « Have fun at the gig. Surprise them all with the song », he said then.  
« I will », Frank assured. « I will. Thank you for calling, I— thank you. Bye, Gee— see you, I guess. »  
Gerard shook his head. No, they wouldn’t have, but it was nice to pretend. « See you. »   
The phone clicked.  It was March 22nd and there was silence in the sunny afternoon. The knowledge that a deep part of himself still loved him hung with the heaviness of the past on his shoulders.   _It will be over tomorrow_ , he thought, and he walked away from all the possible pasts. 

  //

**Author's Note:**

> Frank really does have a gig in Russia tonight. I miss them more than ever.   
> PS. English is not my main language; however, I would like to study abroad, so I need to know if I have made any significant grammatical mistake, to the eyes of a mother tongue reader. Thank you for reading, keep running.


End file.
